A $22 billion clean-energy city being built in the desert outside Abu Dhabi will no longer aim to produce all its own power, the developer revealed on October 10 following a wide-ranging review that retools some of the project's ambitions.
Plans originally called for Masdar City to become a self-contained “carbon-neutral” community of 40,000 residents and even more commuters. Cars would be banned. Waste and water would be recycled.
It is meant to be a marked environmental contrast to other cities in the Emirates, where fuel-guzzling SUVs and year-round air conditioning powered by fossil fuel are common.
Work till 2025
The state company behind the city said on October 10 the project now won't be completed until at least 2020 “four years after the original deadline” and that work could stretch until 2025. The Abu Dhabi Future Energy Co. which goes by Masdar or “source” in Arabic also backed away from original plans to power the city solely on power produced on site. The latest plans still call for the project to rely solely on renewable energy, however.
Masdar said it is exploring a range of clean-energy sources for the city, including geothermal energy and solar thermal cooling, but that it will also consider buying renewable power from other locations. Vast solar arrays were originally slated to provide the bulk of Masdar City's power.
Some parts of Masdar City are already up and running. Students and faculty began moving into six buildings housing a research facility known as Masdar Institute last month. Abu Dhabi is the capital of the UAE, a Gulf federation that has the world's largest ecological footprint per capita, according to the World Wildlife Fund. Masdar City is at the heart of efforts by Abu Dhabi, one of the world's biggest exporters of oil, to position itself as a world leader in renewable energy. The emirate is investing heavily in solar and nuclear power, and was picked last year as the home of the International Renewable Energy Agency. — AP
